Haunting Zoe

Copyright © 2014 by Sherry Ficklin

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce
this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

Cover concept and design by Marya Heiman Copyright ©
2014 by Clean Teen Publishing

Editing done by Cynthia Shepp

Haunting Zoe
is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places and incidents either are products of the
author’s over-active imagination or are used fictitiously. Any
resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead,
is entirely coincidental.

Clean Teen Publishing

PO Box 561326

The Colony, TX 75056

http://www.cleanteenpublishing.com

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As I stand there, looking down at my body, I
can’t help but wonder where my clothes went. I suppose the dude
hosing me off took them, but I can’t be sure. I blink as he flicks
on a large, round light overhead. It’s cold in here, or maybe it’s
just that standing in a morgue, watching some random stranger poke
and prod your lifeless corpse, is enough to give even a dead guy
the chills.

I should leave. But there’s a twisted need to
watch over myself, make sure nobody mishandles my body. Stupid, I
suppose, but undeniable.

He finishes the hose bath just as his
assistant, an older woman with gray hair and rectangular glasses,
walks in, completely oblivious to my nudity, and hangs a suit on
the coatrack. “His father just dropped this off,” she says curtly,
leaving the room without a second glance.

As she rounds the table, her arm brushes
through me. I don’t feel it at all, and she doesn’t seem to either.
I glance down, not at my body, but at myself as I stand there. My
dark denim jeans are loose around my waist, supported by a thick,
brown leather belt. My grey t-shirt is clean—considering—and my
brown boots are tied tightly. Basically, I look the same as I did
two days ago… when I woke up and found myself hovering over my
corpse as police fished it out of the river.

The shock and panic has faded into a dull
ache, a numbness I can’t quite explain. Nothing feels real anymore.
I close my eyes, thinking of my best friend Bruno. In a heartbeat,
I feel the air around me change, warming. The smell of cherry pie
wafts through the air, and I know I’m gone. When I open my eyes,
I’m in his kitchen—a place I’m very familiar with. How many days
had we sat at this granite counter and talked about sports,
homework, and girls? How many nights did he have massive pizzas
delivered while we studied for tests and worked on projects? Now he
sits in his chair, shoving a single cherry around his crumb-filled
plate with his fork while holding his head up with a balled fist.
He’s not smiling, but he’s not crying either. Unlike the scene at
my house where my mother wails constantly, and my father barely
leaves my bedroom. The grief can be overwhelming. Somehow, watching
them suffer makes this whole thing worse.

Taking a seat beside him, I slide into the
chair without having to move it. I wish he could hear me. I need
someone to talk to—someone who can help me figure out what’s going
on.

I never thought much about death when I was
alive, I suppose I just took for granted that I would have plenty
of time for that later. There was never a doubt in my mind that
when you died, you went to heaven or whatever came next. But this
isn’t next, and it certainly isn’t heaven.

There’s a white card beside his plate.
Leaning over, I see the words, which are embossed in gold.

Shenendoah Funeral Home

Sunday, September 7
^th
. 2pm.

Please join us in saying farewell to Logan
Cooper.

Wake from 2-3pm. Graveside service at 4pm.

September 7
^th
?

I stand up, walking right through the counter
to the stainless steel refrigerator, where a paper calendar is held
up with magnets. That’s tomorrow.

How long have I been dead? Days maybe, though
I have to admit the passage of time is a little harder to keep
track of now that I don’t sleep anymore. Even so, the last thing I
remember was…being at a summer pool party with my friends. That had
to be weeks ago.

I turn back to Bruno, who reluctantly eats
his last bite of food, and then stands up.

“What happened to me?” I ask out loud,
knowing he can’t hear me.

His eyes snap up. For a frantic moment, I
think he’s looking right at me. Then I realize he’s looking through
me, at the calendar. He sets his plate in the sink and walks
through me. Taking the marker out of the little holder on the side
of the calendar, he leans forward, crossing off the date.

Correction. My funeral is today.

I close my eyes again, opening them in
Kaylee’s bright pink bedroom. She’s lounging on her bed in a tank
top and shorts. Her feet are propped up on her fluffy pillows, and
her hand hangs off the end while she talks on the phone.

“I don’t know if I can make it,” she says
with a deep sigh.

I can’t hear the conversation on the other
end, but she rolls her eyes.

“I know,” she responds. “But I don’t think I
can do it. I mean, sit there and stare at his casket. It’s not… I
still can’t believe it.”

I sit next to her on the bed. Her face is
flawless, not red or blotchy, even though her eyes are rimmed in
pink, a telltale sign that she either has been crying, or is about
to. Goodness knows I’ve seen those eyes enough over the last year.
I glance at her nightstand. The large, blue frame that used to hold
a photo of us at the winter formal last year now sits empty. In
typical Kaylee fashion, she’d probably burned it after we had a
fight, using the ashes to put some kind of crazy girlfriend hex on
me. That happened often enough too.

“Are you going to be there?” she asks, the
ghost of a smile crossing her lips. “I should be there too. I’ve
got to put this whole thing behind me and move on.”

She hangs up without saying goodbye, tossing
the phone onto the bed beside her.

I frown. Moving on sounds great. If only I
could do the same.

“I suppose I’m dead,” I say out loud, as she
flips over onto her stomach. I see for the first time that there’s
a little box on the floor at the end of the bed, full of photos.
She picks one out. It’s a photo she took of me at the beach last
summer.

“And I know you can’t hear me but… I want to
say I’m sorry.”

She stares at the photo, oblivious.

“I mean, I wasn’t a great boyfriend. I know
that. And you… well, let’s face it, you sucked as a girlfriend. But
you were always special to me, I guess.” I rub my eyes. “God, I
suck at this. I guess I just want to say goodbye.”

As if in response, she grabs the photo by the
corners and tears, ripping my face in half.

“Goodbye, Logan,” she mutters and tosses the
ripped picture aside.

***

I stand outside the funeral home for a long
time, just watching people gather. There are a lot of people, half
of them I don’t even recognize. Even a small group of local
reporters has gathered.

Whatdya know? My death might just be the
biggest news story to hit this stupid little town since that year
the feral pig got loose in the supermarket. It’s hard to miss the
headlines plastered all over the local papers. Heck, even the 5
o’clock news ran a feature about me and how a ‘tragic accident had
cut my promising young life all too short’. And people just ate it
up.

I guess folks love a good tragedy.

What really bugs me about it is that I can’t
even remember what happened. I close my eyes, reach back in my
mind, and there’s nothing. Just darkness. It feels like having
something just on the tip of your tongue but not being able to get
it out. Basically, it’s a very special kind of hell. The kind where
you get a song stuck in your head but you only know half the words,
or you know there is something you are supposed to be doing but
your schedule is blank.

I can’t help but wonder what I did to deserve
this.

I mean, ok. Maybe I wasn’t a ‘good’ guy. Not
like Bruno, or Captain Perfect as I jokingly called him sometimes.
I screwed up all the time, with Kaylee, with my friends, with my
parents. But I always tried to be kind to animals and little kids.
I feel like that should count for something. I mean, so what if I
didn’t recycle? So what if I hosted the occasional kegger while my
parents were out of town? Who cares if I drove too fast and ate too
many bacon double cheeseburgers? So what if I screwed up on the
little things? I never killed anyone, made fun of handicapped
people, cheated on an exam, or stole anything. And those are the
big things, right?

Ok, so maybe this is my punishment. Maybe
this is what happens when people live a half-assed life. If so,
you’d think there would be a whole lot more of us hanging around.
As far as I can tell, it’s only me.

My parents arrive in a black town car. Mom is
in the same dress she wore to the Black and While Gala—last year’s
fundraiser for the local Civil War Museum and Historical
Society—and Dad is in a charcoal grey suit that almost perfectly
matches his salt and pepper hair. His expression is stern, but I
can’t tell how Mom’s doing, thanks to the black sunglasses she is
wearing that are so large they cover half her face. They walk
slowly up the stairs, arm in arm. It’s as if they are somehow
holding each other upright as they walk into the foyer.

A slender woman in a soft, blue dress greets
them at the door, a black folder in her hand. The entrance is
decked out in while lilies and greenery. A long line has formed
just outside the chapel, where a large book sits on a podium. I
breeze past them to get a look at what’s inside.

It’s a memory book. People are signing in.
Beside their name, they are leaving little messages like, “Miss
you, buddy” and “I will never forget that time you scored that goal
in overtime.”

I recognize some of the faces in line.
Cassidy and Becker are already here, standing in line, their faces
solemn. The twins are here, and Bruno. Even a few of Kaylee’s
devoted followers are clustered in a large group near the back.

More people funnel in, my teachers, my
lacrosse coach, and even my dentist and his family show up. The
more people arrive, the more stifling the room becomes, until I’m
hot and I can’t breathe. Can ghosts have panic attacks? I clutch my
chest. The pain is deep, like my heart is trying to push its way
out of my chest. Even though no one can see me freaking out, I
break into a sprint, running from the room and down an empty
hallway. Behind me, the organ begins playing and it’s like the
whole world is crashing down around me. I can’t think straight. To
my right, the door to the coatroom is cracked open so I rush
inside, hoping to drown out the sound.